Welcome to Did You Know, the ESCO HVAC podcast,
the show where we explore the cool, the hot,
and the everything in between of the HVACR industry.
Each week, we dig into the innovations, the insights,
and the inspiring stories that power our trade
from the classroom to the job site and beyond.
This episode is brought to you by this week's
amazing sponsors, Daikin Comfort Technology,
perfecting the air since 1924. Lincoln Tech,
put your potential to work. NAVAC, professional
tools and equipment for HVACR technicians. Amatrol
Trainers, globally impactful, personally empowering.
As well as AGAS, together we can. Whether you're
just getting started or you've been turning wrenches
for decades like myself, there's always something
new for us to learn. I'm Clifton Beck, and this
is Did You Know? The ESCO HVAC Podcast. Let's
dive in. All right, everyone. Thank you for joining
us at the 2026 AHR Expo. We are spending some
time in this fantastic Johnson Controls podcast
booth. I'm a little envious, actually. It's hard
to set up a podcast booth. out in such a large
convention. I don't even know, Rob, I don't even
know how many people we have here. I heard 30
or 40 ,000, but it's a lot. It's going to be
as much as 50 when we're all done. I could see
that. Yeah, absolutely. You know, I'm so glad
to be here with you. Same. We've got a chance
to work together before. Yeah. And it was great.
And it's on helping people understand what's
changing. You are in the heart of what I feel
is going to be one of the largest transitions.
of technicians and technology that we have seen
in the HVAC industry in 100 years. I'll say ever.
Yeah, I think so. Certainly my career. Yeah.
You know, I've been spending a lot of time with
our good friends over at the United Association,
you know, helping put together, like, what is
the plan? Like, as an industry, what is our plan
to prepare not just our instructors, but... even
homeowners and parents, helping them understand
what's happening in this industry. So what we're
really alluding to is we're talking about how
things like data centers are becoming an incredibly
significant component within the HVAC industry.
If we look at smartphone, computer, anything
that we use, we're consuming a huge amount of
data. And what most people don't think about
is the amount of heat that comes out of a data
center. It's insane. Well, I think of it simply
as all the power that we put into the data center.
Yeah. It all becomes heat. Yeah. All of it. It's
all directly converted into it's just we're transferring
energy. That's all it is. But when we say heating,
most of the world doesn't understand how much
heat we're talking about. Oh, no. I mean, you
think of it in terms of like you mentioned home.
Yeah. What does it take to heat my home? Yeah.
Right. We're talking many times, right, for just
one data set. So we need to talk a little bit
about the difference between, like, wet cooling
and dry cooling, the two different types of systems
we're using. But as a reference point, if we
think about a home, like I've got a 3 ,100 -square
-foot home. It's got a three -ton air conditioner,
okay, in the Midwest. That's what I've got. So
an average home, three tons of. It's a common
size for a home. And I just talked to a contractor,
a UA contractor about a project they're doing.
They will not be able to do wet cooling. The
local codes are making them do dry cooling. And
this one building is going to have 400. 20 ton
rooftop air conditioners because they couldn't
go with a wet chiller system. So can we talk
a little bit about that difference between because
we hear these terms, wet cooling, dry cooling.
Yeah. So when we think about the difference between
wet cooling and dry cooling, it's are we going
to use water to reject the heat? Right. Right.
That's a big that's a big part of it. So the
other piece that might be confusing to people
is particularly for a homeowner. that we're going
to use chilled water right at least at some temperature
to take the heat away rather than most homes
have a furnace or some type of an air system
yeah air to air it's moving air around don't
think about water to air let alone water to computer
correct right exactly and so that that's not
just scale it's just the change of the system
and then you start taking it saying everything
builds on on the smallest size And you're just
scaling it up and scaling it up. The difference
is we're reaching scales we've never had to deal
with before. Yeah. Well, I think it's part of
like the driving force in manufacturing of chillers.
It'd have to be. I mean, so think about for us
as York, as a part of Johnson Controls. Yeah.
And some of the most popular products we're using,
the cool data centers now, have centrifugal compressors.
Yeah. Because they're very efficient. Yep. And
they're very scalable in terms of their size.
We are taking products that we may have in the
past made hundreds of in a given period of time.
And now the demand says in that same period of
time, I need thousands of those. Really? It's
that significant? Think about the scale of manufacturing,
which changes design. Yeah. Because now you start
looking at how do I optimize design for faster
manufacturing? Oh, you'd have to. And then. And
I'll just say this transparently, no one manufacturer
can do it enough. So who are we competing with,
even complementing with in the industry to meet
these growing demands of customers? Because there
isn't a single entity that can build enough fast
enough. Yeah. And that, coming back to your first
comment about we're seeing some things, I'll
use the term unprecedented. Yeah, I would too.
have never been a part of our careers. And even
as I think back beyond that, I don't know there's
ever been a time where we've had this much need
for thermal management. So fast, so big. And
that's the thing that we really need to emphasize
to everyone listening is size. So if we think
about let's take a let's take a hotel. That's
an easy one for people to understand. Say we've
got a 10 story hotel. Maybe it's got a few hundred
rooms to it and it might have a chiller or two.
Right. Maybe depending on the capacity, one or
two chillers. Right. of the same size chillers
and we had the same footprint building and we're
only using maybe one story or two story in the
data center how many of those chillers are we
seeing put on one of these buildings now you
might see 20 yeah dozens 30 yeah of those yeah
in in the same footprint in a portion of the
size and that's the piece that is also shifting
yeah for the manufacturers how much capacity
just like the data center right how much capacity
computing capacity can i do in a certain footprint
right now how much thermal management capacity
can i do pulling yeah in a certain footprint
of equipment yeah to be able to take that and
move it somewhere else yeah right whether we're
going to reuse it right and repurpose it like
a lot of uh I think we're getting smarter at
this. We're taking a look and saying, let's build
this data center next to... Around a structure.
Next to structures that are going to use the
heat. Give them heat. But we still have a lot
of scenarios where we're just simply discarding
that to the ambient. Yeah. Well, think about
every residential air conditioner. I mean, that's
what we do. Exactly. We just dump it outside.
We just dump it outside and we say, okay, I got
to get rid of it. I just don't want it in the
space. Data centers have the same thing. Yeah.
But they're dealing with so much more that now
we're starting to think about... I should probably
do something with that heat energy. Because it
cost me something to get it. Yeah, I used the
computing power, but if I could repurpose it,
maybe somebody could buy that again. And why
not? Yeah, we're going to start seeing a shift
in the way we look at energy because of things
like this. Tremendous. Because we can repurpose
that heat. We can put it back into municipal
energy systems and move it around. Like we used
to have steam manufacturing plants. Go back 100
years, you might have a steam plant in a city
that provided heat for all of your downtown buildings.
And that's what we should do when we start looking
at this. You were talking about shrinking that
footprint. I had another conversation with a
very large contractor that's working directly
with the owners of our data centers. And one
particular next generation NVIDIA chip. They're
anticipating should run about 12 times faster
than the current model. That means 12 times the
amount of heat that we're doing now in the same
footprint. Exactly. So the term that everybody's
using is the increased density, right? We're
trying to get more done in the same or less footprint.
You don't have unlimited. No, especially when
you get in town. So you have to make systems
that are efficient at managing that. And we have
a product at the AHR Expo this year that we're
introducing that's all about that. It's how do
I get more capacity, optimize for the range it
has to optimize in, in a smaller footprint. So
that's where our engineering work is. Makes sense.
In solutions. Right. Just like the data centers
are trying to figure out how do I pack more computing
power. Yeah. Into this footprint. Like you mentioned,
a factor of 12. Yeah. Right. In the same space,
especially if you were to take an existing data
center, retrofit it with those 12x chips. Right.
I don't really just want to go 12x on the building.
No. So. I can't go from one acre to 12. I can't.
It's not possible. It's not going to be feasible.
some of the hardest part of it is where do i
put these and where how do i get the land and
then how do i get everything i need to support
this this process so this evolution now are you
seeing that both in um like air -cooled chillers
and water -cooled chillers are you seeing the
changes two products were we just released more
density more capacity right in the same footprint
in an air -cooled chiller and More density, capacity
because of its capabilities of lift. Right. And
how we're going to reject the heat in a water
-cooled chiller. So that trend is growing. And
our engineers are having fun because it's a real
challenge. This is like stepping back into the
age of... of machinery and yeah you know the
mechanical evolution and when we started to automate
things and we had equipment that could do things
that you can imagine a year ago took a lot of
people to do and maybe was really inefficient
exactly so you know our engineers are looking
at opportunities and you know testing new designs
and new principles and i think we'll see a whole
new era of engineering within our industry well
and so one of the first times that you and i
had a chance to work together you had a chance
to see our jadex facility amazing facility facilities
like that are critical yeah to serving this industry.
We're not going to develop those products unless
we have the ability to have a facility that has
those capabilities. Yeah. Right. And to go fast
in doing it so that we can on the heels of a
solution that worked today, we've got a solution
ready to go for whatever we need to do tomorrow.
Right. And for those that don't know what we
are talking about with the J -DEC, that's our
Advanced Development Engineering Center where
they do, I'm sure that's the largest research
and development center in the world for children
technology. It is, right. That's a massive, beautiful
facility that is building great big things in
the research and development stage. Exactly.
That's where we figure it all out. Yeah, very
intriguing. All right. Cool. So I know you got
new innovations in air and in water. We do. Are
they both going to the same places or are we
seeing them being used in different applications?
We're finding, so take a data center customer
that's going to build a variety of data centers.
Yeah. Some strategies that are doing this data
center is getting, let's say, an air cold solution.
Yeah. This data center is going to be. developed
using a water -cooled solution, which, by the
way, is ultimately air -cooled, right? Because
the other big challenge, we talk about real estate,
we talk about power for these, is water to cool,
right? And a lot of places are saying, you don't
have any water to evaporate for cooling. So it's
changing the idea of what a water -cooled chiller
does, right? Because we, for years... We grew
up saying, well, you always reject that too.
Get your big well. Water -cooled. It's only a
dead tower. Now we're doing that for a dry cooler.
So now we're going to optimize it because I can
get more capacity in the same footprint with
a water -cooled chiller. And then I can move
that heat to a dry cooler and not use evaporative
water. so throw that mix in too so it's almost
like i have two air cold solutions absolutely
one starts as a water cold chiller for efficiency
and footprint yeah and then we air cool it and
then i've got an optimized built from the ground
up air cold with your typical coils and condenser
fans but it's always going to take up a little
more real estate as a single piece and i'm sure
based on geography you don't have ideal You have
to use combinations because you may have one
part of the country that has plenty of water,
not enough electricity. Correct. Opposite in
other parts. Which is why the manufacturers have
to have a variety of solutions to be able to
fit those different needs. Could be the same
data center companies, but building in different
areas, different geographies, and different types
of data centers. As that continues to evolve
and shift and change. it's hard to stay on top
of, right? I mean, it really is. Just talking
to the contractors that are building these structures,
they're doing bids. And then if it's not sealed
in the deal in a few months, they may come back
with a change order and it's a completely different
technology. Well, and think about what ESCO does,
right? Educating the industry. Think about how
many more people we need in skilled trades to
be able to execute this one, right? From piping.
to the electrical, to all the controls, then
the maintenance and service, right? We're talking
about taking care of a lot of equipment in a
small area, right? We like to think, oh, we can
space these apart so we have plenty of access
to do it. The reality is minimal access. So you've
got to have people who are really creative, but
there's tremendous opportunity, huge, right?
If you're looking and saying, I want to work
with my hands, this is the time to jump in. Absolutely.
For sure. In this realm, so we just did a podcast
with the Bureau of Labor Statistics talking about
the 10 -year projection, 24 to 34, and the national
average is somewhere around 2 .8 % growth. HVAC
technicians, service technicians, around 8 .3%,
right? Almost three times the national average.
But when we look at those data centers. I was
having the same conversation with some of these
contractors, you know, because I was curious,
like, what are these technicians making? So,
you know, these are highly skilled technicians.
Most of them are, you know, six to 10 years in
the field. And most of them are, now get this,
most of these technicians that are in the service
side of the chiller side, right? They are $170
,000 to $200 ,000 a year jobs. Yep. And I think
that's. that's some of the wake -up call i think
for people who are looking at options yeah where
do i want to uh how do i want to prepare myself
for that career because all of a sudden what
was once unattractive from a compensation standpoint,
maybe relative to if I did something else. Now
it's very attractive. If I go through an apprenticeship
program, I can be out there making that kind
of money in five years and not have a ton of
college debt. Boy, it is. It's a big draw. Yeah,
that's all another conversation. Man, I'm so
grateful to hang out with you. We could do this
for hours. We could. All right, well, I thank
you for joining us. Where can our audience learn
more about your products? and where the industry
is going. Certainly we can learn about the industry
more broadly at our Johnson Controls website,
where we can cover the gamut of everything we
do in buildings. But very specific to these thermal
solutions, our York website. So commercial solutions,
industrial solutions, all the products are there,
all the different technologies that take care
of thermal management and data centers and other
critical facilities that we do. So that's the
best place to go. Cool. Well, I encourage you
all to go check it out and hopefully you'll get
a different perspective on the HVAC industry.